Letter to Leia
by Luke1
Summary: How would you feel if the woman you'd once been in love with was your sister?


Author's note-- Unlike most of my stories, I've actually tried to mke this follow cannon. If you don't think it does, well, then it probably doesn't. This is a possible letter from Luke to Leia the morning after the Battle of Endor. A little lame, I know, but bear with me--the writing is rather good.  
  
  
Leia,  
  
It is...difficult for me to write this to you. I know you have been aware, ever since we first met, of my attraction to you. You were everything I had ever wanted--beautiful, passionate, firey, and, most of all, devoted to your cause, our cause. And as much as I loved you, I could never quite bring myself to show you how I felt except in small, isolated incidents. Like the time we were in the jungle, and I kissed you because it started to rain. I had never seen rain before, and it was so beautiful, and you were so beautiful...but that's all gone now.   
I suppose I should blame myself for never telling you in whole how I felt. Did you ever wonder why I stayed quiet about it, Leia? It was at first the shy nature of a neive boy, but as the years went by it was more and more fear of you saying, at last, just how devoted you were to our cause. So devoted that you could not be distracted by anything, especially a puppy-love romance that we both knew, deep down, would go nowhere.  
I wonder what you would have actually done, had I told you that I loved you. Maybe I over-estimated your aims--maybe you did have time for love after all. But if you had, would you have chosen me? I know, at some point, you loved me as I did you. But I don't know how much or how so. I just know that when I kissed you that day in the rain that you kissed me back; and that when you and I used to stay up late talking in your room that you would eventually fall asleep in my arms, and we would cuddle all night. But somehow, it never felt right to let it go any further than that. And I guess we know whay now, don't we?  
You probably noticed around a year ago when I stopped trying to flirt with you. Our friendship did not change, and we still spent those nights together, but I no longer blushed at your touch or stammered when asking to spend time with you. That was because I felt like your touches were just touches, not hints of of the love we would someday make; and like my asking for your time was just that, not an annoying farmboy asking a princess for a date.   
Why did my additude, my hopes and ambitions change? Because of Han.  
I know what you're thinking as you read this--that you didn't start loving him until around when we left Hoth. It's not true, and you know it. Or maybe you don't. But I know that you've loved Han Solo for a long time, and as soon a s I realized that you loved him more than I could ever hope to be loved by anyone, even you, I tried to step back a bit. Not step down entirely, because until Han was taken by Boba Fett I still hoped I had a chance. But I wanted you to make your decition freely, and I didn't want a broken heart. So I stepped back.  
It was not until we were on the medical frigate together those few days while I was getting my hand...replaced that I saw the helpless look in your eyes, and I knew that it was no contest. So I resigned myself to just being your friend, and I devoted myself to finding Han both for his own sake and so that the woman I loved more than anything else in the universe could be happy.  
The day before yesterday, I told you thae frightning truth about our parentage. It was the single hardest thing that I've ever had to do, save leaving you after that to go face Vader, our father. It was so scary in so many different ways to know that you were my sister--twin sister. I had loved you more than my own life, and now...  
I still love you as much as I ever did. But when I began to step back last year, it prepared me for this. What I feel for you now is more of the kind of love I should feel for you than the kind that I used to feel. But I don't think I will ever be able to fully let go of the way I loved you then; it will always be in the same dark corner of my heart where I hide other things that I fear. Still, I want you to know that I am very happy for you and Han. If I was ment to be your brother, he was ment to be my brother-in-law. I love you both, and you have my blessing with all my heart.  
  
-Luke 


End file.
